A Tale and Hazel Watching
by Mainecoon
Summary: "A Tale from the Tear Stained Alley" -- an accompanying piece to the Hazel Fox Dialogues -- and the poem "Hazel Watching", describing her view in verse.


**A Tale from the Tear Stained Alley.  
**_To accompany the Hazel Fox Dialogues, here is a story of one of the visiters of the Alley._  
  
Megavolt trudged down the streets of St. Canard, alone as always. In his hand he held an old light bulb, fizzled out long ago, and a piece of wire. Every now and then he would glance down at these two battered toys of his, muttering something about "my life's work…" and "washed away like the rain…" and then move on. Had it not been nearly one o'clock in the morning, people walking down the street would have seen him as a rather pathetic sight indeed, with his uniform scorched and torn, his helmet tilted off to one side, and his goggles sliding down his nose. The "Terror-That-Flaps-In-The-Night" had been at him, that much was obvious. But had he finally won the last battle?  
  
Megavolt stopped under a streetlight. He leaned against the metal pole, his face cast in shadows. Slowly he sank down to the ground, letting the light bulb and wire fall from his half-gloved hands (for the rubber around his fingers was mostly burned away). He shivered as a few autumn leaves blew across his feet, now wrapped in white cloth for lack of boots. Pulling his knees up to his chin, he wrapped his arms around them for warmth. As he did this, Megavolt thought he heard soft music playing in the distance. It was strange music, of the kind heard from music-boxes, and it had no recognizable tune or beat. It was just music, like chimes in the wind, and it seemed to be coming closer.  
  
The wind picked up. Megavolt shivered in the cooling air. First frost would come soon, if not tonight.  
  
Then, as suddenly as it had begun, the music stopped. Megavolt perked his ears, trying to hear the mysterious, almost mechanical sound of it again. But to no avail. Megavolt sighed, wondering just how much loss a person could take in one night. He laid his head down on his arms, preparing to surrender to whatever cold or pain might come his way…  
  
"Elmo."  
  
Megavolt did not answer. There were plenty of Elmos in this world.  
  
"Elmo." There it was again. A soft echo fluttering though the night. Behind the whisper was the music again. It was faint, but he could hear it. Megavolt lifted his head.  
  
"Who are you?" he called to the darkness around him, for he could not decide which direction the voice was coming from.  
  
"Come, Elmo. Come to the Alley."  
  
Megavolt stood and turned around. A dark figure stood on the street just out of reach of the lamplight. It held out a hand to him, beckoning him. "It is your time," she said. "Follow me."  
  
Megavolt knew he should feel afraid, but he had had more to fear tonight that a smallish shape who shared his comfort and security in the darkness of night. "Won't you… show yourself?" Megavolt stammered.  
  
The figure stepped forward. One foot at a time, the lamplight inching its way up her body. Slowly, she revealed her identity. She was a silver-furred fox dressed in a midnight-blue cloak with a gold raindrop pattern bordering the edges. Her eyes were deep gray pools, unending tunnels that seemed to say "come look into my soul if you dare take the journey." She was an entrancing figure, all at once mysterious and familiar.  
  
The fox bowed. "Now do you know me?" she said.  
  
Megavolt nodded. Who in the Enchanted world did not know Hazel Fox? She was a legend among all toons. Neither hero nor villain, and favoring only the balance between the two, she had achieved a kind of unheard-of greatness. She was immune to the words and deeds of the villains, and excepted from the duties of the "good folk," as they were referred to by some of the Elders. Her only duty was to be the hostess of the Tear-Stained Alley, a place where all toons ended up when they were past hope, and stayed until their hearts knew with their place and were ready to pursue it. All toons, all over the world, knew of the Tear-Stained Alley and knew that a day would come when it was their turn to come and add their stories and tears to Hazel's collection.  
  
Megavolt took a shaky step forward. Hazel smiled. "Don't worry, friend; the Alley is not far," she said. They walked together to a dark crack in the wall. It was just a space between two shops, something that most people would never see even if they looked right at it. Hazel put her paws on two bricks. As soon as she toughed them, the bricks began to give off a bluish glow. Hazel drew her paws back and they both watched as the walls melted away, widening the crack into a space just large enough for two or three to walk through side-by-side. Above the space was an iron arch that read in twisting, spidery letters "Tear-Stained Alley."  
  
"Be prepared," said Hazel. "I'll go first." She walked forward. As soon as she was under the iron arch, she disappeared in a shimmer of silver shadow. Megavolt was hardly surprised that there was magic at work here. He followed, hesitating only a moment.  
  
Darkness, a sensation not unlike that of being dunked into a bucket of ice-water in the middle of a dream, then Megavolt tumbled onto the dusty black cement that covered the Alley.  
  
"Welcome," said Hazel, offering a paw to help him up. Megavolt scrambled to his knees and quickly let himself be pulled to his feet. He noticed an odd tingling in his fingers when they toughed the ground, and he wasn't sure he trusted this new magic yet.  
  
"Make yourself at home." Hazel led him further into the Alley. It was a very normal-looking alley, really, with garbage dumpsters, wooden crates, and bits of crumpled newspaper lining the edges. But it was longer than most alleys, and wider. Here and there the red brick walls would suddenly turn in or out, forming corners in which boxes were stacked and figures cloaked in the deepest of darkness in the Alley. Every ten feet or so, a single torch glittered on either wall, illuminating the immediate area with a mournful star-like flickering. At the very end of the Alley was an assortment of old mattresses and crates that had been piled to look like a cave. At the entrance was a cardboard sign nailed to the wall. It read simply: "The Dragon's Lair."  
  
"What's that?" asked Megavolt. As he spoke, he noticed the tingling feeling slipping into his bandaged feet.  
  
"The Dragon's Lair," answered Hazel, smirking a reminiscent way. "The Dragon is the Protector of the Alley. He has lived here as long as I, perhaps longer. He has no name, and few but I have seen him. He never leaves his cave."  
  
"What does he… erm… eat?" asked Megavolt nervously.  
  
Hazel was silent for a moment. Megavolt saw that she lost the proud expression on her face and suddenly seemed both younger and older at the same time, if such a thing can be imagined. She had the air of a child who has grown up too fast. "The Dragon and I both are nourished by common source," she answered at last. "It is the reason for the creation of this Alley. There are few others like us…" She was struggling with the words, trying to decide on the right way to explain. "The Dragon and I live on the essence of Sorrow. It is the same feeling that draws the tears of others, both Men and us, or if you want philosophical terms, Real beings and Beings of Reason. Real Beings rarely are able to come here, for the world of Men denies us fiercely. They deny the healing effects of Sorrow, and all her kin. I drink the essence of the tears shed here, and it makes me whole. The Dragon does so too, but in a different way. The Dragon may drink just by being in the presence of Sorrow, while I must be in contact with it and control it." Hazel reached out and stroked Megavolt's forehead. As soon as she did so, Megavolt felt the tingling feeling wash over his entire body. His mind, it seemed, had been freed from distraction. Memories of all the pain he had suffered cam flooding back into his mind. Tears burst forth, flooding down his cheeks whispering words of forgotten hope and lost dreams.  
  
Once more Hazel brushed her paw against him, but this time her touch was reassuring. It made the tears flow harder but it also was ecstacy to let them go. Megavolt felt weakened. His tired legs were on the verge of refusing to hold him any longer. Hazel gently led him to a wooden crate at the far end of the Alley. They sat there together, Hazel holding Megavolt in her arms the way a lioness clutches its prey. She shut her eyes and tilted her head up. A faint smile tiptoed alongside a newly acquired blush at her cheeks.  
  
"The Story-keeper drinks," a soft, harsh voice rasped from the cave. "And so she drinks, and we drink too, hidden away in here. Story-keeper lets the essence seep into the ground for us…"  
  
Hazel sniffed harshly at the Dragon, who responded to his friend with a teasing giggle.  
  
  
Time in the Alley was irrelevant. It could have been minutes or days since Megavolt first set foot on the strange ground. He did not know. Nor did he care, for his current options were to stay here or go home and face his destroyed lab and the Terror that Flaps in the Night. No, he was not ready for that. Not yet. As he sat on the edge of the crate, his bandaged feet dangling a foot or so above the ground and his hands absentmindedly wringing a soggy green handkerchief, Megavolt decided that he would take revenge, he would go back and re-build his life and work, but not until his tears were spent. Not until the Story-keeper, who's silvery fur was seen glinting in the torchlight now and then as she escorted other victims of Life in and out of the Alley, had told him he was ready to go.  
  
But he would return to St. Canard.   
  
**...**  
  
  
**Hazel Watching  
  
**The lighthouse glow, deep into the night,  
Shines like a faery-tale depiction in the snow.  
It is winter in St. Canard.  
His burning lamps, as always warm and bright,  
Tell of a history that only they could know.  
It is night-time in St. Canard.  
  
Talk to me, he pleads of his companions.  
But they are silent, only the wind speaks.  
The storm has come to St. Canard.  
He looks at then and ev'n holds out his hand once,  
But towards him only the frozen winter creeps.  
Stirring in St. Canard.  
  
He turns to face the window and the ice.  
In fall, the blue horizon dwelt outside.  
Remeniscing in St. Canard.  
A single word of friendship would suffice,  
But all have gone in, from the storm to hide.  
It is lonely in St. Canard.  
  
And so he is content to talk alone,  
His words meet ears of glass and rubber wire.  
The sound of the storm dies out in St. Canard.  
So soft the snow, yet hard the hearts of stone  
Who warm themselves together by the fire.  
And yet, I shall find him in St. Canard.  
I shall heal him in St. Canard.  
  
  
.......  



End file.
